Malheur August

By Nancy Judd Minor

Malheur August opens with a map of Malheur County, OR and its Malheur River. "Malheur" means "bad time," we're told--and Nancy Minor plays with that notion skillfully. Set in 1971 with substantial flashback to the 1940s, her novel becomes an utterly convincing portrait of life in rural Oregon a generation or two

• Language: English
• Publisher: Golden Antelope Press
• Release date: Dec 7, 2018
• ISBN: 9781936135653

Book preview

Map of Malheur River and Vale

Malheur August

by

Nancy Judd Minor

Copyright 2018 by Nancy Judd Minor

Cover image by Shanon Green Edwards. Cover design by Rusty Nelson. Map by Jerry Kuykendall.

All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be duplicated in any way without the expressed written consent of the publisher, except in the form of brief excerpts or quotations for review purposes.

ISBN: 978-1-936135-65-3 (1-936135-65-3)

Published by:

Golden Antelope Press

715 E. McPherson

Kirksville, Missouri 63501

Available at:

Golden Antelope Press

715 E. McPherson

Kirksville, Missouri, 63501

Phone: [phone]

http://www.goldenantelope.com

Email: [e-mail]

Inspired! Malheur August is so vivid in setting and character that you feel like you're going back to a place you've never been before and are a part of someone else's life, one that feels utterly, painfully real. And even while you are aching, you suddenly find yourself laughing out loud.

—Cynthia Whitcomb, author of The Heart of the Film

For Warden and Jerry

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Elissa Minor Rust, the best daughter-editor a writer could ask for, and Jerry Kuykendall, who read drafts and gave endless encouragement. Thanks also to my family and friends who supported me and rejoiced in my accomplishment, particularly J. Minor, Quinn Minor, Beth Peterson Minor, Christopher Rust, Dennis Judd, Sandy Yates, and Nan Kammann Judd. Thanks to Shanon Green Edwards for the cover image. Finally, I wish to thank all my former students through the years who taught me as much as I taught them and who inspired me to find my literary voice.

CONTENTS

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

About the Author

It is those we live with and love and should know who elude us.

—Norman Maclean, A River Runs Through It

MALHEUR (French) = mal + heur

Pronounced = MAL hyure

Literally = bad hour or bad time

Probable translation = misfortune

The Malheur River winds its way through eastern Oregon on its journey to the Snake River. This river lends its name to Malheur County, the second-largest county in Oregon with a population density of only three people per square mile.

According to local legend the river received its name from French trappers who had stashed their pelts along its bank. When they returned to retrieve their cache the pelts were gone, probably taken by nearby natives. Because of that incident the unhappy trappers gave the river its name – the Malheur, or river of misfortune.

Vale (population 1817) is the county seat of Malheur County and sits in a narrow valley just two miles wide and fifteen miles long. With its welcome hot springs, Vale was an important stopping place on the Oregon Trail and wagon ruts can still be found just outside of town. The valley is surrounded by sagebrush-covered hills with the Malheur Butte, an extinct volcano, dominating the eastern end.

Chapter 1

The Algoods

(August 1971)

It was the buzzards – that’s how they knew he was dead, Betty assured Oleta after declaring that hearts would be trump.

From the couch across from the arched doorway separating the kitchen and living room, Jean stopped reading mid-sentence. The hermit? Were they talking about the hermit? She had been eavesdropping on Saturday night pinochle games between her parents and their neighbors, Betty and Leroy Fulmer, since she was a little girl, and even though she was now twenty-one and a senior in college, she lowered her well-worn copy of Jane Eyre and listened.

Oh, good lord. Where’d you hear that – from the gossips at that church group of yours? You know it’s not a quarter mile as the crow flies and I never seen no buzzards. Oleta laughed, a rollicking throaty laugh. But I did hear the Oxmans smelled him – they live downwind, you know. Oleta winked at Betty and took a sip from her lipstick-stained highball glass. Betty snickered and Clete shot Oleta a withering look. Leroy, Betty’s husband, kept his head down, eyes glued to his cards. Oleta ignored Clete and passed three cards across the table to Betty. "You’re gonna like those cards, by the way.

Betty studied the cards and slid each one into her hand, collapsed them all into a stack and laid it face down on the table. She retrieved her cigarette from the ashtray and took a long slow draw, fanning herself with a cardboard Jesus fan. You can laugh all you like, Oleta, but if you ask me, if the sheriff had done his job he would’ve moved him out of there a long time ago. I’ve been saying it for years. That man was a menace to decent society. Why, you couldn’t even let the kids go fishing in that part of the river ‘cause of him. I, for one, am glad he’s dead. She ground out her stub in the ashtray and picked up her cards again, fanning them out.

Oleta leaned across the table toward Betty, her enormous breasts nearly spilling from her dress, Well isn’t that just real Christian of you? Did your church ladies tell you he was a black-sheep brother of one of the Navarro clan from up on the bench? That’s what I heard. And you know those Basques are thicker than fleas on a stray dog and wilder than cowboys on the Fourth of July. A black-sheep Basque must’ve done something real bad. She leaned back and drained the last of her whiskey sour. Hell, I’m sorry I never lit out across the field and made his acquaintance. I could’ve used some sizzle in my life. Oleta’s bawdy laugh echoed in the cramped room. Jean winced.

Oleta Algood! Betty frowned, scrunching her thick brows into a single bushy furrow of disapproval. She laid down the queen of hearts, took the set, and played her last card. Tiny beads of sweat pooled on her brow and in the creases of her neck. She daubed her face with an elaborately embroidered handkerchief and fanned herself. A large moist patch had formed on her back and two more under each ample arm, the dampness spreading like a red tide. She shook out a new cigarette from her pack and tapped it twice on the table before lighting it. Leaning towards Oleta as though the dead man could hear her, she whispered from behind her fan, What d’ya suppose he done?

Clete slammed his cards on the table and aimed a wad of tobacco juice at the coffee can at his feet. His voice quivered with barely checked rage. Are you two old hens gonna gossip or are you gonna play? Goddamn it, a man’s pecked to death around here even when he’s dead. He shoved his empty glass across the table. Oleta, get me another drink.

Oleta shoved the glass back. You can get your own damned drink. Hells bells, Clete. We was just talking. What the hell’s the matter with you tonight? Leroy gathered the cards and reshuffled, averting his eyes. Betty looked away and took another slow drag on her cigarette. The only sound was the whirr of the box fan and the chirping of crickets. A loose corner of the faded yellow wallpaper flapped with each rotation of the fan.

On the couch, Jean’s stomach lurched. Over the years she had become fine-tuned to the nuances of her father’s voice, the ominous lowering of pitch, the clipped cadence that signaled an impending explosion. Jean had been away the better part of three years, but five seconds of that voice and she felt the walls closing in. She burrowed deeper into the couch and willed herself to focus on her book.

Glancing up, she saw Clete’s jaw quiver as he leveled an icy stare at Oleta. Oleta smirked, as though daring him to react, and fanned herself with a paperback novel. Clete stuffed another pinch of Copenhagen under his lip and lurched upright. As he shoved away from the table the heel of his hand caught the edge of the ashtray, upending it.

Jesus H. Christ! What the hell was that doing there? Before anyone else could react, Leroy righted the ashtray and began sweeping the butts into his hand.

My fault, Clete. I think I might’ve pushed that over there a minute ago when I was dealing. Leroy’s whispery voice and habitual slow delivery contrasted starkly with Clete’s harsh, explosive outburst. Jean had a sudden memory of a game she and her cousin Will had played as children, in which they had assigned bird names to all the people they knew and the other person had to guess them. She couldn’t recall what birds they had come up with for most people, but she did remember her father and Leroy Fulmer. Both she and Will had agreed that with his gentle demeanor and soft voice Mr. Fulmer was a Mourning Dove; her father was a Redtailed Hawk.

Leroy dumped the butts into the coffee can and sat back down. Sorry about the mess on your floor, Oleta, but I think I got most of it. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his neck, then picked up his cards and spread them out in the same slow, methodical way.

Clete grunted and brought the bottle of Seagrams back to the table to fill his glass, ignoring Oleta’s empty one. Leroy, can I get you another drink? Oleta’s sure as hell too damned lazy to lift a finger around here.

Leroy put his hand over his glass and shook his head, studying Clete anxiously. Clete spit into the coffee can at his feet and took another drink of whiskey, his spare body rippling tensely.

Before Oleta could respond, Betty reached over and rested her fingers on her arm. Say, did you hear about Maxine Merkley? She up and left Ross high and dry. She’s staying over to Ontario with her daughter. The word is she caught him fooling around with some other woman, don’t know who. Can you imagine? Maxine Merkley of all people! I didn’t think she had the gumption.

Oleta scowled at Clete. Sounds like he was the one with the gumption. Or she was plain sick of him. Don’t think I haven’t given it a thought myself. And I wouldn’t have no trouble finding another one neither, I’ll tell you that.

Leroy cleared his throat and reached for the can of Copenhagen in his pocket. You know, Clete, I was thinking that next weekend you and me might go up to the Owyhee Reservoir and do some fishing. We’ve both of us been working pretty hard the last couple of weeks. Leroy’s voice was scarcely audible, but Clete visibly relaxed as he turned his attention to the fishing trip they began to plan for the following Sunday. Oleta rolled her eyes at Betty, but let it drop.

From her corner of the couch, Jean watched her mother from behind her book. Oleta was no beauty, but she had ample curves and an earthy sensuality that drew men. Watching her mother, Jean figured that she wouldn’t find it hard to snare someone else. Jean couldn’t remember a time when her parents weren’t either fighting or on the edge of a fight. Why they had stayed together all these years was a mystery. As children, Jean and her sister Mae had dreaded Saturday nights when they would be awakened by the drunken sparring of their parents, the barbed insults piercing the papery walls of the tiny clapboard house. No pillow was thick enough to muffle the sound, no blanket warm enough to make them feel safe. They had only one another to cling to. Eventually the fight would end with Oleta threatening to leave, but the next day they’d get up and carry on as before, measuring off each miserable day together.

Jean wondered what it had been like for her older brother. Clark had left for teaching college when she was still in grade school and never came back to live with them. His visits home were regular but brief, and most of his time was spent with Oleta. Jean and Clark had never had a meaningful conversation. Perhaps it had been different for him. Perhaps there had been a time when Oleta and Clete had been happy, a time when Clark was younger, a time before she and Mae had been born. There were actually five Algood children, if she counted the twins who had died before Mae and Jean were born. Like Jean and Oleta, Clark had dark brown eyes and rod-straight hair. In the only two photos of the twins, those same chocolate eyes stare at the camera beneath mops of the same dull brown hair. Only Mae, the fine-boned blonde child with the pale aquamarine eyes, resembled Clete, which had always been a barb Clete used to goad Oleta. When he wanted to rile her, or when he was drunk enough, he’d accuse her of having affairs with one or the other of the neighbors, because only one of those damned kids is mine.

Remembering those fights, Jean knew how much she wanted to avoid hearing one now, so she closed her book and slipped out of the room. Back in her cramped closet-sized bedroom she changed into her baby dolls and stretched out on the worn patchwork quilt that her grandmother had made for her shortly before she died. The faded window curtains hung slack and lifeless with not a whisper of breeze to disturb them. In the distance a lone coyote howled. Jean found the familiar sound comforting, companionable even. She picked a loose thread off the quilt and stared out the window at the clothesline silhouetted against the moonlit sky and the empty fields beyond. As she listened, the coyote howled again and was joined by another and then another in a howling cacophony. The odd discordant concert brought with it a turbid tumble of memory and she found herself missing Mae.

She and Mae had shared a small bed in this tiny room until Mae graduated from high school and left home. In the six years since Mae had walked across the stage and accepted her diploma she had returned only twice, even though Vale was only an eight-hour drive from Portland. But for some reason, a reason she could not explain even to herself, Jean came home every Christmas and at least once each summer. And every Christmas and every summer she wound up in this same room having the same interior conversation, wondering why she had come. Abruptly the coyotes ceased their calling. Jean waited, listened intently until they began again, then snuggled into the quilt to read, eventually drifting off to sleep.

* * * * *

Jean, get your lazy college-girl ass out of bed and come help me with the milking! The screen door slammed behind Clete as he left for the barn. Jean, who couldn’t even remember crawling between the sheets, clawed herself to wakefulness. Hanging over the sink in the kitchen, she splashed cool water on her face, willing the fog to lift. She felt leaden, hung over, even though the strongest thing she’d had to drink the night before had been a coke. God, I could use some coffee, she thought. The lowing cows told her Clete was moving the first group into the barn. Birdsong floated on the morning breeze; a garrulous rooster crowed repeatedly. Jean’s barn clothes were where she had left them seven months before, still grimy, still sour with dried milk, still hanging stiffly from a hook in the kitchen closet. The overalls crunched as she stepped into each stiff leg. She struggled to pull up the jammed zipper, yelping when she nipped a finger. The milk-stiffened laces of her old barn shoes broke when she tried to tie them.

After checking to make sure Clete was inside the barn where he wouldn’t see her, she sat down on the front step and blew on her pinched finger. Three half-grown yellow tabbies head-butted her, vying for attention. Martha, the ancient gray three-legged cat, purred and rubbed against her leg. Despite her sullen mood she stroked the cats, even smiling at the longhaired black cat perched atop the doghouse like a raven. When she knew she dared not wait any longer, she sighed and started for the barn, the yellow cats trailing behind her like a line of ducklings.

For the first half hour, as she filled the troughs with hay for the cattle, her mood was as sour as her clothes. Feeding the young calves, though, delighted her as it always did and she was smiling when she headed to the barn to help Clete with the milking.

The caustic stench of urine and manure permeated the barn, the pungent odor overwhelming her the moment she opened the door. The gorge rose in her throat. A half-gallon tin can sat on a shelf inside the door waiting to be filled with milk for the house; on the packed dirt outside the barn two large pans waited to be filled with milk for the cats. A skinny calico stretched out on the shelf next to the milk can and eyed her lazily. She squeezed past a complacent cow in the first stanchion and stepped over the shallow trough behind the stalls that caught urine and manure.

I finished up with the calves. What needs to be done in here still?

Clete was sitting on a stool behind the large Holstein at the far end of the barn, stripping the cow’s udder of the milk the machine had left.

"Start on Patsy, she still needs to